Jury finds Crose guilty of lesser charges

Monday

Feb 10, 2014 at 12:19 PMFeb 10, 2014 at 9:08 PM

By Jeff KolkeyRockford Register Star

Editor's Note: This story was updated to correct the sentencing range for aggravated reckless driving.

ROCKFORD - A jury took just over eight hours to find Anthony D. Crose guilty Monday of four counts of aggravated reckless driving in connection with a 2011 Christmas Eve crash that took the life of his wife and stepson and badly injured members of another family.

Crose was found not guilty of two counts of reckless homicide.

Aggravated reckless driving is punishable by probation or one to three years in prison.

After the verdict, the prosecuting and defense attorneys declined to comment. Crose's bond was revoked.

Both parties will appear before Judge Brian Shore at 9 a.m. Wednesday at which time a date for sentencing will be determined.

The trial featured graphic pictures of the two-vehicle crash on U.S. 20 near Perryville Road, testimony from witnesses and crash reconstruction experts who could only agree that Crose was speeding but not his actual rate of speed at the time of impact.

"It's true, I'm sure, he has to live with this every day," Dehn-Miller said. "But that does not excuse him from criminal responsibility. It does not excuse recklessness. It does not give you a free pass."

Crose pleaded not guilty to all charges but testified he remembered little about the events of Dec. 24, 2011.

Crose, 35, was behind the wheel of his Ford Mustang traveling west on U.S. 20 near Cherry Valley, about one-quarter mile west of the Perryville Road overpass. Witnesses said Crose was changing lanes to pass a vehicle when he lost control of the sports car, flew across the median and into the path of an oncoming 2002 Dodge Caravan carrying a family from Roscoe. Crose's wife, Dea, 33, stepson Cole Trusler, 15, and daughter Alexis, 13, were ejected from the Mustang upon impact.

Dea and Cole were killed. Crose and Alexis were critically injured. Members of the Mathias family from Roscoe were badly injured including Mark Mathias who was left in a coma for nine days.

Crose's attorney Debra Schafer argued Crose was headed home with his family to celebrate the holidays. He was merely attempting to change lanes to avoid a green diesel truck belching clouds of black smoke when Crose lost control of the vehicle, Schafer said Monday.

Defense experts attempted to disprove claims of police investigators who accused Crose of driving 124 mph before the crash. A defense expert said the speed was actually 82 mph: Still above the posted 65 mph speed limit, but not recklessly fast.

"He changed lanes like we do every day," Schafer told jurors. "He did not change lanes at 124 mph. That is not supported by the evidence."

Schafer also argued that speed alone is not enough to prove a case of reckless homicide and aggravated reckless driving.

The trial pitted the defense's sterile computer simulations against the mangled evidence of a Winnebago County Sheriff's Police detective.

The defense attempted to use arguments based on the laws of physics, mathematical equations and a computer program called PC Crash operated by Henry Vega of Semke Forensic, a national forensics firm with offices in Chicago.

Vega argued that Crose's Ford Mustang Saleen was traveling at 82 mph when it spun out of control, crossed a grassy median and crashed into an oncoming Dodge Caravan loaded with four members of the Mathias family of Roscoe.

Vega challenged crash reconstruction results showing the Mustang went airborne and argued the Mustang never left the ground. He claimed those were faulty conclusions based on outdated police methodology and attacked the choice of formulas police used to calculate the Mustang's speed.

Vega used a software crash simulation program in an attempt to refute the state's claims.

But tire tracks and gouges plowed into a muddy, grassy median proved that the high-performance Mustang went airborne when it was launched sideways over the median at a high-rate of speed, Senior Deputy Michael Pearson testified.

Vega made little or no note of the key evidence presented by Pearson.

In a trial scene that could stand out in the minds of jurors, Dehn-Miller confronted Vega with a photograph: It showed the near side of the median with no tire tracks, the other with deep gouges in the mud.

Pearson testified that evidence in the grassy median shows where the vehicle landed after being launched into the air following a "sideslip velocity event."

Vega tried to argue the vehicle "never went airborne" but struggled to explain how the deep gouges were created in the mud on the far side of the median, while leaving no visible marks on the other.

His computer model of what happened also never explained how the Dodge's undercarriage cut into the pavement. Pearson said the Mustang's rear end hit the Dodge at a downward angle that lifted the rear of the Dodge up and onto a guardrail.

Vega also attempted to prove that the Mustang had slowed to just 42 mph when it hit the Dodge going 52 mph.

Dehn-Miller told jurors Vega's speed estimates were the result of "garbage in, garbage out" in a questionable computer program.

Witnesses testified that a Jeep Navigator was safely passing the green truck Crose described, but that Crose was impatient and "tried to thread the needle" between the SUV and the truck when he lost control at "reckless" speeds, Dehn-Miller told jurors.

Dehn-Miller again relied on photographs in her closing arguments to the jury on Monday as she argued the Mustang was going 82 mph at the time of impact with the Dodge. She held up photos of the wreck.

"Does that look like a crash at 42 mph to you?" Dehn-Miller asked, holding up the photos. "Is 42 enough to send it spinning 3½ times? Use your life experience. Use common sense."